Coltair moved the brazier to the far corner of the vault and lit it. It took a moment for the fuel to catch, but soon it stuttered and flared, spreading finally to burn evenly.

Dropping the kindling twig in the bowl, he turned to survey the room. A crypt for former emperors, this was the final resting place of every forefather since the beginning. Nearly three thousand years of ancestors.

It was not a gallery. After two generations, the previous quad of rulers was walled in and a new vault opened. At present, Coltair estimated there was enough room in the current infrastructure for one more century of emperors, not including his father.

He eyed the slip that stood waiting for Cirrus. Workers would have begun the effort the moment he ascended and, he noted, they’d made progress. The sarcophagus was carved out and the statuary on the sides and surrounding niche had begun in his tribute. The final piece, the lid, would be ornately decorated with his likeness. It would come last to seal him inside after a month of state viewings and official mourning.

With a smirk, Coltair turned away.

His father was terrified of dying and of death. He abhorred the crypt and never went below the main level of the palace, even on Ancestors’ Day. A day of celebration for the population, a day of reflection for the royal family. Instead, Coltair always made the trip by himself. That’s when he’d first heard them. Now, he came as often as his public image allowed.

Son of sons, welcome and avow to us your progress.

Coltair lifted his head and looked around, but nothing was out of place. The brazier remained low; he’d used a modest amount of fuel to burn small and for only a short time. The ancestors didn’t like warmth and light, but they humoured him.

“I am to be a father once more,” he replied plainly. “I will have a fourth descendant by the fall. It is confirmed.”

The voices remained silent, but he imagined they were pleased. He was barely twenty-one and already threatening to surpass his father’s contributions.

“Do you require more?” he asked tiredly. Normally, the ancestors didn’t answer personal questions, but he was looking to the plans he wanted to begin, not to the endless cycle of domesticity he was relegated to endure.

Heed the next step in your plan, o’ king: Look to the west, look to the west. A like-mind; a listener. Take from her the gift; take from her the key to our salvation!

Coltair whirled but not in any true direction.

“Gift? What gift?” he asked of the empty air. When no further response was offered, he grumbled in frustration.

“I am nearly twenty-two. I have waited long enough!” he growled. “Do I kill my father now or will you?”

The outburst rang in the stone-enclosed room and the silence following felt close.

If you secure the Listener and the gift, your time is at hand. Only when the gift is confirmed under your influence may you return.

Coltair stood with his mouth open. They had never given him an ultimatum before.

“How will I know this Listener? What is this woman?” he demanded.

Coltair…. The voices whispered. Son of the winds, father of Darkness…

With a curse and an incredible amount of willpower to not shout, he turned and left quickly, leaving the blasphemous brazier burning where it stood.

---

Coltair always slept badly. Ever since the ancestors had invaded his mind as a child, his nights were often interrupted by their messages and images of nonsense and scripture. On and on, they would preach about the importance of his mission, his role in the coming, so-called, ‘salvation.’ That was all fine and good, but rarely was the sequence of events clear and in any particular order.

Since he could remember, he’d repeatedly had the vision of a man standing in green fire, burning on the crest of some great battlefield, bizarrely holding an infant child wailing in his arms. More frequently, he had flash images of his children drowning in the bay, Candice with them, the swirling water swallowing them to the depths. Some nights, he stood in a dense-growth forest, with snow swirling around the trunks and a cloaked figure blazing in intense orange and red fire, bolts of lightning erupting outward in loud zaps. The figure would stand in menacing silence, waiting for him, a heavy cloak pulled over their face.

This night was new.

Coltair stood on the high cliff of a sea bluff, somewhere he did not recognize. Below, on the vast stretch of beach, the figure of a woman stood with her back to him, her long hair whipping past her shoulders in the wind, her face away from him. The moon lit the water and whitecaps and erased the woman’s footsteps from the wet sand as she walked. Coltair didn’t know this woman-but knew beyond question she was real.

Lightning flashed and he startled. When he looked at the woman, she had turned. Purple eyes glowed steadily on him. Thunder crashed.

Take thy crown, King of the Underworld. Take the Listener and the Gift. Take thy destiny and our world. Bring forth the Darkness and secure thy seat among us!

Gasping loudly and dripping in sweat, Coltair bolted upright in his bed. The breeze shuffled the drapes at his window, casting shadows on the floor. The moonlight washed the room of colour.

His time was at hand.